One of the first steps you take when you are figuring out your gardening schedule is find your USDA Zone info. The zone info helps tell us things like average date of last frost and lowest expected temperature for your area.

A common way of making a decision about when to plant cardinal flower is to check out the USDA zone info for Marshall.

Planting Calendar for Cardinal Flower

Frost tolerance for cardinal flower:	Not tolerant of frost.
When to plant:	After the last frost has passed.

Cardinal Flower require warm weather which tells us that you really should wait until it warms up after the last frost before you can plant them.

The earliest that you can plant cardinal flower in Marshall is May. However, you really should wait until June if you don't want to take any chances.

The last month that you can plant cardinal flower and expect a good harvest is probably August. You probably don't want to wait any later than that or else your cardinal flower may not have a chance to fully mature. You can get started a few weeks earlier by starting your cardinal flower indoors.

Last Frost Date

On average all chance of frost has passed is on May 15 in Marshall. In the coldest months of winter you should expect an average low temperature of -25°F.

Keep in mind that the actual date of last frost is not always accurate because it is based on the USDA zone info for Marshall and it can change quite a bit from year to year. Since half of the time in Marshall there is a last frost after May 15 be ready to cover your cardinal flower if you have one of those late frosts.

USDA Zone Info for Marshall

Here is the info for USDA Zone 4b.

Average Date of Last Frost (spring)	May 15
Average Date of First Frost (fall)	September 15
Lowest Expected Low	-25°F
Highest Expected Low	-20°F

This means that on a really cold year, the coldest it will get is -25°F. On most years you should be prepared to experience lows near -20°F.

Plants to Grow in Marshall

You may be interested in your other planting guides for Marshall.